FORMER unified featherweight world champion Yuriorkis Gamboa returned to winning ways at the weekend when he edged past Alexis Reyes in Cancun, Mexico.
The 35-year-old Cuban, who was once considered one of the most exciting fighters in the world, has fallen from grace in recent years after spells of inactivity and a brace of stoppage losses.
The most recent of those came in May when he was stunned by Robinson Castellanos in seven rounds. He bounced back from that reverse against Reyes, who drops to 15-3-1 (7) after being outpointed over 10 rounds by Gamboa.
However, Gamboa – who has also been stopped by Terence Crawford, back in 2014 – failed to impress against Reyes, and was only able to scrape past him with scores of 95-94 (twice) and 94-94.
Reyes had been picked as an opponent for Gamboa to look good against, however he could not muster the sort of performance that would get his trajectory in the right direction again. He still campaigns at lightweight, where he lost to both Crawford and Castellanos, but it is unclear what his next move will be.
Indeed, Gamboa’s form has dipped drastically ever since his thrashing at the hands of Crawford. Beside the loss to Castellanos, he has only beaten limited opposition, one of whom – Rene Alvarado – dropped him in the 10th round.
